


Granya of the Seven of Coins

by ArcherUmi



Series: Dungeons & Dragons [1]
Category: Dungeons & Dragons - All Media Types, Original Work
Genre: Fantasy, Fluff, Gen, Sailing, Slice of Life
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-08-30
Updated: 2020-08-30
Packaged: 2021-03-06 16:48:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 2,921
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26202178
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ArcherUmi/pseuds/ArcherUmi
Summary: The stories of a young sailor, swordswoman, and adventurer.
Series: Dungeons & Dragons [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1902826





	1. Tacking

**Author's Note:**

> Pretty much just backstory scenes (and maybe in the future some stuff adapted from the campaign I'm in, but we'll see) for my Dungeons & Dragons character, Granya. The first three chapters are really short and also pretty old (written March 2018), from before I'd played the character at all, so they're a bit rougher than my more recent work and the way I write/play Granya has changed since then both from getting a chance to actually RP her and from there being a two year period where I didn't do much with her.
> 
> Technically this is all set in the Forgotten Realms, but I don't actually know the setting well – I've never read any of the novels, was never a huge PC RPG player, and the campaign stalled out after a few sessions (but hopefully will be coming back soon) – so it doesn't matter to the story very much and I doubt it's that accurate to Forgotten Realms canon.
> 
> There are definitely some liberties I've taken; the aesthetic is on the whole more early modern era age of sail-based than medieval fantasy I feel and apparently Faerûn hasn't developed the printing press, so the mentions here and there in my writing of Granya's habit of reading swashbuckling novels might not really make sense given I doubt popular literature could exist without widespread printing – the price of a book in the 5th edition PHB is equivalent to about four months pay for an unskilled laborer and two weeks pay for a skilled artisan listed in the tables for the cost of services, for reference.
> 
> I didn't really describe Granya's appearance at all in these (I'm not that great at character descriptions I feel like), and given the good art I have of her was drawn by other people and isn't posted anywhere publicly – so I don't feel comfortable putting it here – the best I can give you is [the sprite edit](https://i.imgur.com/D4YaFo5.png) I did myself back in 2018 too.
> 
> I feel really pretentious making a tag for my OC and also guilty that I'm making more work for tag wranglers but there's some stuff I wanted to post as separate works and I wanted to tie the stories with her together (NOTE: I've since removed the tag). It's a very Irish name because I thought Chondathan names sounded Celtic, but apparently the language (as much as it exists; don't get me started on DnD linguistics) is actually more Italic-based.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Written March 2018.

The small boat bobbed gently up and down on the water as it sailed, a cool spring breeze blowing over the sails and the evening sun low in the sky ahead. The shoreline of the cape rose to their left and the city of Athkatla behind them. Granya held the tiller, her father, Ronan, keeping it steady with one hand, the other holding the mainsail taught with a rope. "Are you ready?", he asked. Granya nodded, her expression a mix of excitement and apprehension. "Mhm!". She took a deep breath and concentrated. Ronan slowly removed his hand from the tiller and eased up on the rope. "Port helm!".

Granya's eyes lit up, and she pushed it left, the boat lurching rightward. "A little too fast; ease up just a bit!". She pulled it back slightly and they smoothly turned, sails flapping as the boat crossed the eye of the wind. Ronan knelt, ducking his head as the boom swung around and they completed a ninety-degree turn. He pulled the sail in, and Granya eased up on the rudder until the sail stopped flapping, letting it rest. She beamed, her mouth agape. "I did it, I did it!".

Ronan smiled at her. "You did well. I was older than you are the first time I helmed a boat if I recall". He tousled her hair. "You'll make a great sailor some day, Granya."

"Are you sailing again soon, daddy?", she beamed up at him. "Yes; to Snowdown in about a week's time."

Granya looked at him pleadingly. "Can I come with you? I really want to sail on a big ship too!". He laughed. "Not yet, not yet. But when you're a little older, I promise. Now--", he loosened up on the sails. "--Let's try tacking back, and then we'll turn and run downwind to port before the wind turns. We promised your mother we'd be on land early enough to help her prepare dinner after all."

She grinned, giving a loose salute before taking hold of the tiller with both hands. "Aye aye!".


	2. Fencing

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Written March 2018.

Grinning and with fire in my eyes, I skipped backwards, leaning to and fro to dodge the thrusts of the wooden sword. My sparring partner Egil, our ship's Illuskan captain, changed tactics, swinging it instead. I barely ducked it in time, hitting the ship's deck and rolling out of the way. Glancing what I thought was an opening, I jabbed with my own singlestick, stopping short an inch from his neck. I blinked, hearing some scattered applause from the handful of other hands watching our duel, and got on my feet. 

"That's the first time you've got the better of me, Granya. You've taken to swordfighting quite well since I've been teaching you". Egil dropped his weapon. "You'd really never touched a sword before you joined this crew?". I shook my head. "Nope! I wasn't a circus girl either". He threw his head back and laughed. "Well, you'd have done well as a performer with how quick you are on your feet."

I shook my head. "Maybe as an acrobat, but I can't sing worth shit". I dropped my sword and cracked a grin. "A'ight captain, your bet was if I could best you in a year, all my drinks next port call would come out of your share from the voyage."

Egil laughed again. "Old smuggler bastard or not, I'm a man of my word... All goes well tonight we'll make Waterdeep by tomorrow evening."

As if on cue, a gust of wind blew across our deck, knocking around our practice weapons. I shivered, pulling my cloak closer, still not used to the cold seasons in these parts. I grabbed the swords and turned my head up at the gray sky.

"The storm's coming in sooner than I'd like", Egil remarked, looking up at the darkening clouds. I felt a drop of rain on my head. "Reef topsails!", he bellowed out, and the crew starting scrambling. I tossed the swords to Egil and started scurrying up the rigging myself.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yeah, we're randomly switching perspective. I used to write a lot in first person because I was writing an original slice of life anime inspired story and had _The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya_ in my mind because it's the only light novel I've actually read, and plus it kinda makes sense for a character that I was going to be roleplaying.
> 
> The _Seven of Coins_ in the title is Egil's ship, although I hadn't named it when I wrote this.


	3. Night Watch

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Written March 2018.

I yawned, leaning on the railing and looking out over the ocean, the full moon reflected on the calm sea. Not even half way through my night watch and I'm already exhausted and my mind is wandering. I'm not usually much of an introspective one. It's been a little over a year now since I joined up with this crew. The excitement I wanted, I've certainly gotten, but...

' _It's no great crime if we happen to place some cargo in a hidden compartment. It's just extra space after all!_ ', Egil had explained his view on things, around the time I'd signed on and his ship's less-than-legal activities had been brought up. ' _And if we happen to misremember some of our cargo, say, when a customs inspector asks, an honest mistake! All sailors are drunkards, after all!_ ', he'd added, grinning and chuckling, over a mug of ale, of course. I suppose so. Hell, I'd probably cheat on taxes.

It gave me pause though. My father had always strived to be an upstanding man as a sailor, as a merchant, as a father and husband, and I don't like to think about how he would see this line of work. But it was hard not to think about it, almost alone as we sailed for Baldur's Gate. More than half way home.

"I want a fucking beeeeeer...!". I sighed, holding up the small stone amulet on a cord around my neck, a crescent moon shape carved on its face. I glanced up at the moon, closing my eyes and muttering some half-hearted thanks to Selûne. I smiled a little. "Smooth seas at least."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I feel like this scene was particularly weak writing. I don't even know what they were smuggling or why, really. Is anything illegal in Waterdeep? I guess they were just trying to avoid tariffs to pad their profit margins or something.
> 
> The way I've played her since, the current incarnation of Granya is a bit more straight-laced than this and less of a drunk; she probably wouldn't actually cheat on her taxes. Which does mean it makes a bit more sense that she had a moral dilemma over just a bit of tariff evasion.


	4. Fireworks

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Written July 2020. Chronologically, this is about a year or two before chapters two and three.

Granya slouched over the shop counter and sighed as the customer who'd just handed her a few gold coins for a set of porcelain plates closed the door.

As much as she enjoyed sailing it was always nice to be home... It was just that getting pressed in to tending the store the day after she got back wasn't much fun. It might be fine if there was at least something to do, but today had been slow and she'd been left doing not much else but sitting at the counter all day. It was a typical pleasant summer evening for Athkatla, warm, clear, and dry, with the sun surely still beating down outside as it began to set out to sea. The only issue was how stuffy the shop tended to get in weather like this.

She stood up again, glanced back at the paper bag she'd set on the floor, and couldn't help but grin. Sure, on hand she had once again spent way too much money on trinkets she'd happened to see at market in a foreign port – some magically-infused fireworks this time, which was an even dumber idea than the trick magic pen she'd picked up in Calimshan and which had not lasted for nearly long as advertised – but on the other it was totally going to be worth it. 

"Hey Granya--", she turned to see her younger sister standing in the stairwell that led up to the house, "--mommy said she wants you to come chop vegetables for dinner and that me and Ciaran can mind the shop."

Granya frowned. She had fallen for Sive's pranks far too many times not to question her. "Wait, she wants _you_ to? If this is a lie I'm not gonna to let you come watch when I set off those fireworks."

"She's not allowed to chop vegetables since last time she did she hurt herself playing with the knife", Ciaran said, appearing in the stairway behind Sive.

"Hey, you played with them too!", Sive said, turning to glare at him.

"Only because you kept asking me to play with you."

"...Really, you should just stop listening to her", Granya said, letting out a sigh and shrugging her shoulders. "Only gonna get you in trouble."

"She gets you with her pranks all the time Granya", Ciaran said. She winced. "Ehe... Yeah, well look, I learned my lesson, didn't I?".

She was about to go upstairs and leave Sive – who Ciaran hopefully would stop from causing any real trouble – at the counter when she heard the bells attached to the door ring and glanced over to the front of the shop, expecting to see a customer she could leave to her brother and sister. Instead, she saw a familiar face.

"Eithne!", she said, smiling and leaning over the counter. "I didn't know you were coming over. Don't you have your own place now?"

"Hey", Eithne replied, closing the door behind her. "You're gone so often these days. I had to pay a visit when I heard my kid sister was back."

"Oh, shut up. You can't call me your 'kid sister' when Sive exists". Eithne cracked a slight smile and Granya noticed Sive frown out of the corner of her eye.

"Granya!", she heard their mother shout from upstairs. "Didn't Sive tell you to come help with dinner?".

"Coming!", she shouted back. "Hey, Eithne's here! Hope there's enough food for everyone!", she added.

"Well if someone would come cut vegetables already. Oh, and tell her to wake your father up if he's still napping!".

"...Yeah. Ehe". She walked up the stairs with Eithne following her, stepping around Sive and Ciaran and into the kitchen, before grabbing a knife and starting to dice the carrots, onions, and tomatoes as her mother opened the stove and added another piece of firewood. Dinner that night was a simple meal of fish and vegetable rice, but it was a welcome thing to sit down to a meal with her whole family for the first time in months, and Granya silently said a few words of thanks to Selûne, the moon goddess, for the safe seas that had brought her and her father's ship home.

She watched the sun set from her room after dinner, leaning out the open dormer window on the third floor as it sunk below the horizon, past the docks and the seawall and out over the ocean, and leafed through a book in the waning light. She'd only made it through a few pages of the cheap adventure novel before the light had faded enough to make reading any more impractical and forced her to set it down on the nightstand, and soon after that the bright orange sky had become pale blue twilight.

Closing the window, stretching her arms, and pausing to clip her sheathed dagger to her belt, she made her way down the stairs again to the shop. She saw their mother help Ciaran and Sive just finishing closing it up for the night as she grabbed her bag of perhaps unwisely-stored fireworks from by the counter and smiled.

"...You two still want to see this?".

They both smiled, Sive in particularly grinning wildly.

"You learned how to use those before you bought them, right?", their mother asked. "You'd best be careful."

"Yeah, yeah. Something like that". Granya withered a little as Maeve stared directly back at her. She was never especially harsh, but it took a certain amount of toughness to raise four children, especially with a husband who was so often away at sea. "...Really, ok? Don't worry, I won't let Sive touch anything but the little sparklers."

Sive was glaring at her now too. Maeve sighed. "Don't stay out too long and be careful. Keep your knife with you."

"I know, I know--", Granya gestured at her belt. "--I've got it."

"Good girl". She stopped herself from rolling her eyes. Her mother was right about the knife, yes, but she'd already thought to take it herself. And really, she wasn't _really_ a kid anymore, was she? She could hardly complain when she knew full well it came from a good place, but the compliment still felt a bit patronizing. Not that the world couldn't be a dangerous place, but she'd already seen enough to know it wasn't all bad.

"...Alright, c'mon then!", she said to Ciaran and Sive as she walked to the door and stepped out into the steadily cooling night air. Her two younger siblings followed her, their mother shouting for them to stay close to her as they walked. It was only a short distance from the three-story row-building, down broad but windy streets lined with stone oil lamps, to the riverbanks, where there sat a narrowish strip of grass, a rare thing to find in the city, sloping down to the water.

Granya set the bag down on the ground and looked inside. Conveniently the small collection of explosives included three handheld sparklers to go around. That, plus a rocket. She grinned, taking it out the rocket and glancing aside at Sive, who was looking at it in wonder.

She reached out and lightly flicked her forehead. "I'm really not gonna let you touch this one."

Her sister glared at her again, but she cut her off before she could protest. "Seriously, it's not someone to play around with if you don't know what you're doing."

"Do _you_ know what you're doing, Granya?", she asked back.

"Yeah, pretty much. The guy I bought it from told me how it works". She thought back to the brief explanation on how use it safely, driving the stick it was tied to on into the dirt and waved Sive – Ciaran having already moved a safe distance from the two of them and the rocket – away as she struck a match, lit the fuse, and scampered away herself. She plopped down on the grass, a smile on her face and her eyes fixed on the burning wire.

It quickly reached the end, and with a satisfying bang the rocket popped off the stick and shot into the air, her eyes darting up to follow it as it briefly climbed high above the riverfront and exploded into thin trails of brilliant white fire.

"...See, isn't that awesome?". She looked over at the awe-struck looks on Ciaran and Sive's faces. "Too bad I couldn't afford any more of those."

She fished the three sparklers out of her paper bag, handing one to each of them. Ciaran raised an eyebrow.

"Do these explode too?".

Granya shook her head. "Nah, they just kinda sparkle. Just don't touch the flame or anything and they'll be safe."

Satisfied, he took it, and she lit another match, holding it up. "Alright, on three let's all light them, ok? One... Two...--", they all got ready to touch the wicks to the flame, "--Three!".

The string burned quickly and the sparklers came to life as Granya blew out the match, red sparks flickering and slowly turning orange. Sive quickly began to swish it around in front of her, grinning from ear to ear as the trails of light that followed the tip of the sparkler now turned from orange to yellow. Ciaran merely stared at his as it slowly burned.

Granya glanced down at her sparkler, only to see it barely turn orange before fizzling out in a puff of black smoke.

"...Seriously?!". She jiggled it a few times vainly hoping something might shake loose and it would relight, but to no avail, and she sighed, sitting down on the ground again and watching the sparks dance as Sive and Ciaran waved theirs around, colors passing from yellow to green and green to blue as they burned down. But she couldn't help herself from glancing down the river, thinking she could just barely see the last tiny bit of sunlight as it slipped into the sea and catching sight of the swaying masts in the lantern-light.

She took a deep breath, the faint smell of salt hanging in the air. It all made her think about the past two days and wonder what more there was to her restlessness than just the boredom of sitting behind a shop counter on a quiet day.

The sparkling light had faded all the way to a deep purple when she looked back at her brother and sister, before sputtering and flaming out entirely.

"Hey, Sive, Ciaran", she said, and they looked over their shoulders at her as she stood up. "I'm still thinking about it and I'll need to talk to mom and dad, but I think next time I head out to sea I might not come back home for a long while."

It didn't look like either of them knew how to answer. "...Come on, wouldn't you like it if you didn't have to worry about me ruining your schemes, Sive?", she teased, grinning. "Without me around to look after the two of you I'm sure Ciaran falls for them more often than not, right?".

Sive, who had looked genuinely a little sad, went back to her usual self, glaring at her and crossing her arms dramatically. "Fine, good riddance. Hmph."

"Sive!", Ciaran said, grabbing her shoulder.

"That's more like you, Sive!", Granya said, stifling a laugh. "...Well, anyway, I just think it would be nice to see as much of the world as I can, and I've gotta start somewhere. I'm not cut out for taking over the store when I'm older or anything. You guys can have it as far as I'm concerned."

She gathered up the paper bag and the expended sparklers. "Come on, let's get home before it gets any later, ok?".

"Oh, hey, I know", she said as they walked, grinning. "How about I promise that whenever I'm home next time I'll bring back more fireworks?".

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'd had the beginning of this scene in my head for a little while, but didn't have an idea for what the story was really about until I was sitting around on the Fourth of July seeing some friends online complain about the fireworks and being able to hear and kind of see them from my bedroom window. I wrote the first half and then finished it a few days later after the idea for the ending came to me.
> 
> I'd decided Granya had siblings before this, but I also wanted to write it because I realized I hadn't thought at all about her relationship with them and it felt like a missing part of her character. I played a one-shot with her the weekend of the fourth (first time I'd actually gotten to play DnD for like two years), after I'd written the first half and I realized after the fact that she basically treated one of the party members the same way she treats her little sister here. The bartender also complimented her for being polite while a bunch of the other people in the inn were causing a commotion and I feel like that also kind of tracks with her having tended shop herself, heh.
> 
> I feel like I'm probably writing her life as being too comfortable for her living in a medieval fantasy setting here, even if her family is pretty solidly middle class and Athkatla from what I know is one of Faerûn's wealthiest cities. I don't know fireworks exist in the Forgotten Realms either and even if they did I don't know if Granya could afford them on a sailor's pay.


End file.
